“Interracial” Sex and Racial Democracy in Brazil: Twin Concepts? Journal Article uri icon

Overview

abstract

  • Racial democracy is maintained in Brazil through both scholarly and popular discourses that consider “interracial” sex as proof of Brazil's lack of a racial problem. In this article, I scrutinize the discourse that asks, “How can we be racist when so many of us are mixed?” I argue that racial discourses are embedded in everyday interactions, but are often codified or masked. “Race” is especially pertinent to sexuality, yet the two have hardly been analyzed together. In fact, it is not the belief in a racial democracy that is at the heart of Brazilian racial hegemony, but rather the belief that Brazil is a color‐blind erotic democracy. Using my ethnographic data, I illustrate that “race” is embodied in everyday valuations of sexual attractiveness that are gendered, racialized, and class‐oriented in ways that commodity black female bodies and white male economic, racial, and class privilege. [Brazil, race, sexuality, poverty]

publication date

  • September 1, 1999

has restriction

  • closed

Date in CU Experts

  • November 2, 2013 10:54 AM

Full Author List

  • Goldstein D

author count

  • 1

Other Profiles

International Standard Serial Number (ISSN)

  • 0002-7294

Electronic International Standard Serial Number (EISSN)

  • 1548-1433

Additional Document Info

start page

  • 563

end page

  • 578

volume

  • 101

issue

  • 3